When Optimism Breaks Your Heart (And Why I Still Choose It Anyway)
- STACEY K
- Jun 19
- 2 min read
I’ve always been an overthinker.
I’ve always been wildly optimistic.
I’ve always believed that good things come to good people, period.
But the truth? That’s not always how it goes.
The exciting things you think are just around the corner don’t always show up when you expect them to.
People don’t always respond with the love, honor, or respect you thought was mutual. They fall short, they let you down, they hurt you beyond belief—because they’re human.
The dreams you thought would cost a certain amount of time, money, or energy? The cost is always higher than anticipated—financially, physically, emotionally.
And sometimes I wonder, like really wonder, if it’s worth it to keep showing up with so much hope. Optimism has cracked my heart more times than I can count. Many times unbearable.
And yet, here I am, still holding on to it.
Because as I sit with it today, I know this: I refuse to give up on hope.
I refuse to stop looking for the silver lining, sun in the storm or whatever we want to call it.
I refuse to cave in.
Because if I did, I’m not sure I’d climb back out. Forging on would be impossible. And I can’t let that be my story.
So instead, I choose to channel it (after I cry a bit in the Starbucks parking lot).
The frustration. The letdowns. The heartbreak. I will gather it all up and I repurpose it. I will refocus and continue to stand firm in what actually matters. And I pour my energy currency into that. Period.
That frustration becomes fuel. It becomes willpower. It becomes fire. Not victimhood, but instead survivorship. And then, from survivorship, something even stronger: warrior energy.
It’s that spark that pushed me to write Bring Your Big Energy.
It’s what helped me launch a business when every voice in my head said I wasn’t ready.
It’s what keeps me going, despite the health issues, the unknown, the rejection, the pivots, and the pain.
Because at the heart of it all is transformation.
The slow, messy, powerful kind.
The kind that takes all your intensity points and asks you, “Now what will you make of this?”
Like molten glass, we’re at our most shapeable when the pressure is on. What feels like too much heat in the moment is often the exact thing that allows us to become something stronger, clearer, and more intentional as we rebuild. We don’t break in those moments. We transform into something even greater, which is what we were meant to be all along.
And that, to me, is Big Energy.
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